Recently there appeared in Paris, in a publication of the Forward group, a pamphlet: "The Contemporary Situation and Tasks of the Party. A Platform Worked Out by a Group of Bolsheviks." This is the very same group of Bolsheviks about whose formation as a new faction the expanded editorial board of Proletariat announced in the spring of last year. Now this group, "consisting of 15 party members – 7 workers and 8 intellectuals" (as it informs us), comes forward with an attempt at a complete, systematic, and positive exposition of its peculiar "platform." The text of this platform bears obvious traces of cautious and careful collective editing, directed toward smoothing over all roughnesses, erasing sharp corners, emphasizing not so much that in which the group diverges from the party as that in which it agrees with it. All the more valuable for us is the new platform as an official exposition of the views of a known tendency.

The group of Bolsheviks first sets forth how it "understands the contemporary historical situation of our country" (§ I, pp. 3–13), then how it "understands Bolshevism" (§ II, pp. 13–17). It understands both poorly.

Let us take the first question. The view of the Bolsheviks (and the view of the party) was set forth in the resolution of the December Conference of 1908 on the contemporary moment. Do the authors of the new platform share the views expressed in this resolution? If yes, why not say so directly? If yes, why was it necessary to draw up a special platform, to undertake an exposition of their own peculiar "understanding" of the moment? If no, why again not say clearly in what exactly the new group comes into opposition with the party's views?

The thing is that the new group itself is unclear about the significance of this resolution. The new group unconsciously (or half-unconsciously) tends toward the views of the recallists, which are incompatible with this resolution. In its pamphlet, the new group provides a popular exposition not of all the provisions of this resolution, but only of one part of it, not understanding (perhaps not even noticing the significance of) the other part. The fundamental factors that provoked the revolution of 1905 continue to operate, – says the resolution. A new revolutionary crisis is ripening (point e). The aim of the struggle remains the overthrow of tsarism and the conquest of a republic; the proletariat must play a "leading" role in the struggle and strive for "the conquest of political power" (points d and 1). The conditions of the world market and world politics make "the international situation increasingly revolutionary" (point zh). The new platform provides a popular exposition of precisely these propositions, and to that extent it goes entirely hand in hand with the Bolsheviks and with the party, to that extent it sets forth correct views and does useful work.

But therein lies the misfortune – that one must emphasize this "to that extent." Therein lies the misfortune that the new group does not understand the other provisions of this resolution, does not understand their connection with the rest, does not understand in particular their connection with that irreconcilable attitude toward recallism which is characteristic of Bolsheviks and which is not characteristic of this group.

Revolution is again inevitable. Revolution must again overthrow and will overthrow autocracy – say the authors of the new platform. True. But that is not all that the contemporary revolutionary social-democrat must know and remember. He must be able to understand that this revolution comes to us in a new way, that we must go toward it in a new way (otherwise than before; not only as before; not only with the same instruments and means of struggle as before), that autocracy itself is not what it was before. That is precisely what the defenders of recallism do not want to see! They stubbornly wish to remain one-sided and in this way, contrary to their will, independent of their consciousness, they render service to opportunists and liquidators; they support one one-sidedness by their one-sidedness in the other direction.

Autocracy has entered a new historical period. It is taking a step along the path of transformation into a bourgeois monarchy. The Third Duma is an alliance with definite classes. The Third Duma is not an accidental but a necessary institution in the system of this new monarchy. The new agrarian policy of autocracy is likewise not a matter of chance but a necessary, bourgeois-necessary and in its bourgeoisness necessary component link of the policy of the new tsarism. Before us is a peculiar historical period with peculiar conditions for the birth of a new revolution. One cannot master this peculiarity, one cannot prepare for this new revolution if one acts only in the old way, if one is unable to utilize even the Duma's tribune, etc.

That last proposition the recallists cannot understand. And the defenders of recallism, declaring it a "legitimate shade" (p. 28 of the pamphlet under consideration), have been unable to understand the connection of this proposition with the entire circle of ideas, with a recognition of the peculiarity of the contemporary moment, with an effort to account for this peculiarity in their tactics! They repeat that we are living through an "inter-revolutionary period" (p. 29), that the contemporary situation is "transitional between two waves of democratic revolution" (p. 32), but they are incapable of understanding what is peculiar in this "transition." And without understanding this transition, one cannot overcome it with advantage for the revolution, one cannot prepare for a new revolution, one cannot move on to the second wave! For preparation for a new revolution cannot be limited to repeating that it is inevitable; preparation must consist in such a formulation of propaganda, agitation, and organization as would take account of the peculiarity of this transitional situation.

Here is an example of how people speak about the transitional situation while not understanding what the transition consists in. "That in Russia there is no real constitution, and the Duma is merely its phantom, without power and significance, this is known well by the masses not only from experience, but now it is becoming clear to the whole world" (p. 11). Compare this with the evaluation of the Third Duma by the December resolution: "The alliance of tsarism with the Black Hundred landlords and the upper strata of the commercial and industrial bourgeoisie has been openly recognized and consolidated by the state coup of June 3rd and the establishment of the Third Duma."

Is it not "clear to the whole world" that the authors of the platform simply failed to understand the resolution, although they chewed and rechewed it during the course of a year in the party press in a thousand ways? And they failed to understand not because of their lack of comprehension, of course, but because of the pull over them of recallism and of the circle of recallist ideas.

Our Third Duma is a Black Hundred–Octobrist Duma. That the Octobrists and Black Hundreds in Russia do not have "power and significance" (as came out for the authors of the platform) is absurdity. The absence of a "real constitution," the retention of full power by autocracy does not in the slightest exclude that peculiar historical situation when this power is compelled to organize a counter-revolutionary alliance of known classes on a nation-wide scale, in openly acting institutions possessing nation-wide significance, and when the known classes themselves organize themselves, from below, into counter-revolutionary blocs, extending a hand to tsarism. If the "alliance" of tsarism with these classes (an alliance aiming to preserve power and income for serf-owning landlords) is a peculiar form of class domination and domination of the tsar and his gang in this given, transitional period, a form generated by the bourgeois evolution of the country under the condition of the defeat of the "first wave of revolution," – then there can be no question whatsoever of utilizing the transitional time without utilizing the Duma's tribune. A peculiar tactic of utilizing that tribune from which counter-revolutionaries speak, for the purposes of preparing revolution, is then obligatory, flowing from the peculiarity of the entire historical situation. If, however, the Duma is merely a "phantom" of a constitution, "without power and significance," then there is no new stage before us in the development of bourgeois Russia, a bourgeois monarchy, in the development of the form of domination of the higher classes, etc., and then the recallists, of course, turn out to be right in principle!

And do not think that the phrase from the platform we have cited is a chance slip of the tongue. In a special chapter "On the State Duma" (pp. 25–28) we read from the very beginning: "all State Dumas up to the present time have represented institutions without real force and power, not expressing the actual correlation of forces in the country. The government convened them under the pressure of popular movement in order, on the one hand, to divert mass agitation from the paths of direct struggle onto the paths of peaceful electoral ones, and on the other hand, in order to come to an understanding in these Dumas with those social groups which could support the government in its struggle against revolution…." This is a whole tangle of confused thoughts or fragments of thoughts. If the government convened the Dumas in order to come to an understanding with counter-revolutionary classes, then it follows from this that the first and second Dumas did not have "force and power" (to help the revolution), while the Third does have and does have (to help the counter-revolution). Revolutionaries could (and under certain conditions should have) refused to participate in an institution which was powerless to help the revolution. This is indisputable. By uniting together such institutions of the revolutionary period with the Duma of the "inter-revolutionary period," which has the force to aid counter-revolution, the authors of the platform commit a monstrous error. They extend correct Bolshevik arguments to precisely those cases to which they actually do not extend! This is precisely what it means to turn Bolshevism into a caricature.

In summarizing their "understanding" of Bolshevism, the authors of the platform have even put forward a special point d (p. 16) in which this "caricature" revolutionariness found for itself, one might say, a classical expression. Here is this point in full:

"d) Until the completion of the revolution, all semi-legal and legal means and paths of struggle of the working class, including also participation in the State Duma, cannot have independent and decisive significance, but are merely a means of gathering and preparing forces for direct revolutionary, openly-mass struggle."

It turns out that after the "completion of the revolution" legal means of struggle and parliamentarism "included" can have independent and decisive significance!

That is incorrect. And then they cannot. In the platform of the Forward-ists, nonsense is written.

Furthermore. It turns out that "until the completion of the revolution" all means of struggle other than legal and semi-legal – that is, all illegal means of struggle – can have independent and decisive significance!

That is incorrect. There are such illegal means of struggle which, both after the "completion of the revolution" (for example, illegal circles of propaganda) and "until the completion of the revolution" (for example, seizure of funds from the enemy or forcible liberation of the arrested or assassination of spies, etc.) "cannot have independent and decisive significance, but are merely" and so forth, as in the text of the "platform."

Furthermore. What "completion of the revolution" is being spoken of here? Obviously not the completion of the socialist revolution, for then there will be no struggle of the working class, since there will be no classes at all. Therefore, we are talking about the completion of the bourgeois-democratic revolution. Now let us see what the authors of the platform "understood" by the completion of the bourgeois-democratic revolution?

Generally speaking, this term can be understood in two ways. If it is used in the broad sense, then by it is understood the solution of the objective historical tasks of the bourgeois revolution, the "completion" of it, that is, the elimination of the very ground capable of giving birth to bourgeois revolution, the completion of the entire cycle of bourgeois revolutions. In this sense, for example, in France the bourgeois-democratic revolution was completed only in 1871 (and began in 1789). If, however, the word is used in the narrow sense, then it means a particular revolution, one of the bourgeois revolutions, one of the "waves," if you will, which batters the old regime but does not finish it off, does not eliminate the ground for the following bourgeois revolutions. In this sense, the revolution of 1848 in Germany was "completed" in 1850 or in the 50s, without thereby eliminating the ground for the revolutionary upsurge of the 60s. The revolution of 1789 in France was "completed," say, in 1794, without thereby eliminating the ground for the revolutions of 1830, 1848.

Whether one interprets the words of the Forward-ists' platform "until the completion of the revolution" in the broad or narrow sense, – in any case no sense can be found in them. It goes without saying that attempting to determine now the tactics of revolutionary social-democracy until the completion of the entire period of possible bourgeois revolutions in Russia – would be quite absurd. But regarding the revolutionary "wave" of 1905–1907, that is, the first bourgeois revolution in Russia, the platform itself is forced to acknowledge that "autocracy defeated the first wave of the revolution" (p. 12), that we are living through an "inter-revolutionary" period, "between two waves of democratic revolution."

What, then, is the source of this endless and hopeless confusion in the "platform"? Precisely in this: that the platform diplomatically separates itself from recallism while not moving at all out of the circle of recallist ideas, not correcting his fundamental error and not even noticing it. Precisely in this: that for the "Forward-ists," recallism is a "legitimate shade," that is, for them the standard, the model, the unsurpassed model is the recallist shade of caricature Bolshevism. Whoever has set foot on this slippery slope will inevitably roll down into the bog of hopeless confusion; he repeats words and slogans without being able to think through the conditions of their applicability and the limits of their significance.

Why, for example, did Bolsheviks in 1906–1907 so often counterpose to opportunists the slogan: the revolution is not finished? Because the objective conditions were such that there could be no question whatsoever of the completion of the revolution in the narrow sense of the word. Take even the period of the Second Duma. The most revolutionary parliament in the world and hardly the most reactionary autocratic government. Hence there was no direct way out except either a coup from above or an uprising from below and, whatever the wise pedants may now shake their heads about, prior to the coup no one could guarantee that the government would succeed, that it would go smoothly, that Nicholas II would not break his neck on it. The slogan "the revolution is not finished" had the most living, immediately important, practically felt significance because only it correctly expressed what there is and what things are heading toward by the force of the objective logic of events. But now, when the recallists themselves acknowledge the given situation to be "inter-revolutionary," to attempt to present this recallism as a "legitimate shade of the revolutionary wing" – "until the completion of the revolution" – is this not helpless confusion?

To escape from this hopeless circle of contradictions, one must not temporize with recallism but cut at its ideological roots; one must take a stand on the point of view of the December resolution and think it through to the end. The given inter-revolutionary period is not explained by chance. Now there are already no doubts that before us lies a particular stage of the development of autocracy, the development of a bourgeois monarchy, bourgeois-Black Hundred parliamentarism, bourgeois policy of tsarism in the countryside, the support of all this by the counter-revolutionary bourgeoisie. This period is undoubtedly a transitional period "between 2 waves of revolution," but in order to prepare for the second revolution, it is necessary to precisely master the peculiarity of this transition, to be able to adapt one's tactics and organization to this difficult, heavy, dark but imposed upon us course of the transitional "campaign." The utilization of the Duma's tribune, like all other legal possibilities, belongs to the number of rather lowly means of struggle, carrying nothing "brilliant" with it. But the transitional period is transitional precisely because its specific task is the preparation and gathering of forces, not their immediate, not their decisive appearance. To be able to set up this activity stripped of external brilliance, to be able to use for it all those semi-open institutions which are characteristic of the epoch of the Black Hundred–Octobrist Duma, to be able to defend on this very ground all the traditions of revolutionary social-democracy, all the slogans of its recent heroic past, the entire spirit of its work, its complete irreconcilability toward opportunism and reformism, – here is the task of the party, here is the task of the moment.

We have examined the first deviation of the new platform from the tactics set forth in the resolution of the December Conference of 1908. We have seen that this is a deviation in the direction of recallist ideas, in the direction of ideas that have nothing in common either with a Marxist analysis of the moment we are living through or with the fundamental premises of the tactics of revolutionary social-democrats in general. We must now examine the second original characteristic of the new platform.

This is the task proclaimed by the new group of "creating" and "spreading among the masses a new, proletarian" culture: "developing proletarian science, strengthening truly comradely relations in the proletarian milieu, working out a proletarian philosophy, directing art toward proletarian strivings and experience" (p. 17).

Here is a sample of that naive diplomacy which serves in the new platform to cover up the actual matter! Is it not naive when between "science" and "philosophy" they insert "the strengthening of truly comradely relations"? The new group brings into the platform its supposed grievances, its accusations of other groups (namely, of orthodox Bolsheviks in the first place) of violating "truly comradely relations." Precisely this is the real content of this amusing point.

"Proletarian science" looks "sad and out of place" here as well. First, we know now only one proletarian science – Marxism. The authors of the platform for some reason systematically avoid this only precise term, putting everywhere the words: "scientific socialism" (pp. 13, 15, 16, 20, 21). It is known that in Russia this latter term is claimed by the direct opponents of Marxism as well. Second, if one puts in the platform the task of developing "proletarian science," then one must say clearly which particular ideological, theoretical struggle of our time is meant here and on which side exactly the authors of the platform are standing. Silence about this is naive cunning, for the essence of the matter is clear to anyone who knows the social-democratic literature of 1908–1909. In our time, in the sphere of science, philosophy, and art, a struggle between Marxists and Machists{102} has come to the fore. It is at least absurd to close one's eyes to this universally known fact. "Platforms" should be written not to obscure disagreements but to clarify them.

Our authors betray themselves awkwardly by the quoted passage of the platform. It is universally known that in fact "proletarian philosophy" means precisely Machism – and every sensible social-democrat will immediately expose the "new" pseudonym. There was no need to invent this pseudonym. There is no need to hide behind it. In fact, the most influential literary nucleus of the new group is Machist, which considers non-Machist philosophy to be non-"proletarian."

That is how one should have said it if they wished to speak of this in the platform: the new group unites people who will struggle against non-"proletarian," that is, non-Machist theories in philosophy and art. This would have been a direct, truthful, open appearance of the ideological tendency known to all, an appearance to struggle against other tendencies. When ideological struggle is given important significance for the party, then one comes forward with direct declaration of war, not by hiding.

And we shall call upon all for a definite, clear answer to the concealed posing of philosophical struggle against Marxism in the platform. In fact, it is precisely struggle with Marxism that all the phrases about "proletarian culture" conceal. The "originality" of the new group is that it has introduced philosophy into the party platform without saying directly which tendency in philosophy it defends.

However, one could not say that what is set forth in the cited words of the platform is wholly negative in its real content. Behind them there also lurks some positive content. This positive content can be expressed in one name: M. Gorky.

Indeed, there is no need to hide the fact, about which the bourgeois press has already shouted (distorting and perverting it), namely, that M. Gorky belongs to the supporters of the new group. And Gorky is unquestionably the most outstanding representative of proletarian art, who has done much for it and can do much more. Every faction of the social-democratic party can legitimately be proud of Gorky's belonging to it, but on this ground to insert in the platform "proletarian art" – means to give the platform a certificate of poverty, means to reduce one's group to a literary circle, which exposes itself precisely in "authoritarianism"… The authors of the platform speak very much against the recognition of authorities, not explaining directly what the matter is. The matter is that it seems to them that the defense of materialism in philosophy and the struggle against recallism by Bolsheviks is an undertaking of separate "authorities" (a thin hint of a thick circumstance!), who are, they say, "blindly trusted" by the enemies of Machism. Such outbursts are, of course, wholly childish. But it is precisely with authorities that the "Forward-ists" deal badly. Gorky is an authority in the sphere of proletarian art – that is beyond dispute. To attempt to "utilize" (in the ideological sense, of course) this authority for the strengthening of Machism and recallism means to give an example of how one should not deal with authorities.

In the sphere of proletarian art, M. Gorky is an enormous plus, despite his sympathy for Machism and recallism. In the sphere of development of the social-democratic proletarian movement, a platform which isolates in the party a group of recallists and Machists, putting forward as a special group task the development of supposedly "proletarian" art, is a minus, because this platform wishes in the activity of a major authority to consolidate and utilize precisely what constitutes his weak side, what enters as a negative quantity in the sum of the enormous benefit he brings to the proletariat.